Scorpion
in antiquity, a military engine, formerly used chiefly in the defense of a castle or town. It resembled the balista.
In Scripture, a painful scourge; a kind of whip armed with points like a scorpion's tail.
In zoology, any individual of the family Scorpionides. The European species are three or four inches long, and confined to the S. parts of the Continent, but scorpions have a wide geographical range in tropical and sub-tropical regions, and in Equatorial Africa and South America they grow to a length of 9 or 10 inches.
The sting in the tropical species is much more formidable than that of the European scorpion. They are nocturnal in habit. They prey on spiders and other insects; and, seizing their prey in their SCOTCH FIR palpi, which are practically useless as weapons of offense, sting it to death. The eggs are hatched in the enlarged oviducts, AM CAROLINA SCORPION and the young, usually from 40 to 60, are carried about for some time on the back of the mother.